Guild Wars 2

I was very sceptical of the expansion at first and I have to say the first few weeks in the jungle were very frustrating. I didn’t know where to go, didn’t find enough people to play with and when exploring (the thing I like the most) always ended up dead somewhere in the middle of nowhere.

But then I started to find things that I liked and avoided things that I don’t, and while I’m still baffled by some choices (the grind for experience and map currencies is insane), I think overall it wasn’t all bad. I realize that it’s very little content and that it’s gated like hell, but if you take a little time it’s okay I guess. (If I hadn’t spent the time in game that I did in the past few weeks I would have walked away dissatisfied though – if you don’t have a lot of time it’s very frustrating and you don’t get to play half the content.)

My favorite map is Auric Basin. It’s vertical but not too much, it’s big but not confusing, it’s got lots of events and a great story (Skritt!), and the meta event is doable and rewarding.

Least favorite is Tangled Depths of course. It’s just a mess and I have a hard time getting to events and finding enough people still. Too bad because it’s like they had a good idea and then completely went overboard with the map design and complexity and verticality.

Verdant Brink is okay but annoying to navigate mainly because of missing and contested waypoints. I would play it much more if it had two or three more waypoints and most of them weren’t contested all the time.

Dragon’s Stand is also okay, but first of all it’s not really a map and second the event is too long while awarding too little time for exploration at the end. And even with the 64bit client I have had a few sad disconnects in all the wrong moments.

I like where they go with the quarterly updates and hope that they manage to balance content and moneygrabbing a bit better moving forward. Sometimes lately it’s gotten a bit too obvious..

All in all I’m okay with where the game is now but they need to work on the right stuff now and learn some lessons from HoT. I think a lot of players would profit from some critical QoL fixes (see below) and that would go a long way towards keeping people happy.

Things to do better next time:
- Make smaller maps as well, maybe a new mid level map
- Consider putting other events than just meta events in them as well
- A 2 hour event like DS is probably a bit too long
- Put in some more waypoints, and place them where they aren’t contested all the time
- Gating story progress or map progress is not fun, at least not to the extent it was done here

The things that need to be fixed first (now!):
- Adjust the LFG tools by giving all HoT maps and SW a different tab each
- Adjust megaserver to make it more likely for people to land in a populated map
- Save map progress and hold a place in the map for 1-2 minutes in case of disconnects
- Put the keys from each map (machetes etc.) in the wallet where they belong – or make a separate tab for them. I know they are probably not yet in there to make more bank and inventory space necessary, but really it’s all being a bit too much and it’s probably annoying people more than it’s bringing in money (and no the new account wide inventory slots are not a practical solution for this).

/agreed
/signed

That’s one of the better-worded critiques of the issues with some decent suggestions, too.

I think that the biggest mistakes for HoT have been

• There’s no transition zone between core Tyria & the new maps. Unlike Orr (which also disconcerted tons of people the first time they entered), there aren’t a ton of zones to help you prepare for HoT. It would have been good to have one map that didn’t have a meta, some of the adventures (with lekittenous time outs), and a chance to gain some masteries.
• Once you reach Magus Falls, you really need gliding to get around, so the first tier should have been included.

Other than that, I agree with the OP: the trend is good, there are some issues that are fixable even now, and it’s ok that everyone doesn’t love everything in the expac.